I Don't Want To Miss A Thing
by Kat Lee formerly Pirate Turner
Summary: Joseph watches Rogue sleep.


Title: "I Don't Want To Miss A Thing"  
Author: Pirate Turner  
Dedicated To: Pirate Sparrow  
Rating: G  
Spoilers: Joseph's fate  
Summary: Joseph watches Rogue sleep.  
Disclaimer: Joseph; Rogue; Remy "Gambit" LeBeau; Magneto; the X-Mansion; and the X-Men are © & TM Marvel comics and are used without permission. The song is "I Don't Want To Miss A Thing" and is © & TM its proper owner (probably Aerosmith). Everything else is © & TM Pirate Turner. The author makes absolutely no profit from this story.

_I could stay awake just to hear you breathing  
Watch you smile while you are sleeping  
While you're far away dreaming  
I could spend my life in this sweet surrender  
I could stay lost in this moment forever  
Every moment spent with you is a moment I treasure_

Blue eyes filled with love gazed adoringly upon the beautiful face below him. He was silent as he watched her sleeping form, his heart aching for her as a song played through his mind. It was a song that he had once sang to her and sung to her several times more, but she had never heard him except for that one time. She'd awakened in the middle of the night to find him sitting up in her bed, propped up on one elbow and intently gazing down upon her just as he was now doing. She'd asked him if everything was all right, and he'd told her that everything was perfect for they were together. When she had then continued to ask him what he was doing awake, he had sang Aerosmith's "I Don't Want To Miss A Thing" to her, his voice soft and low so as to not wake the others in the surrounding bedrooms. He smiled fondly at the memory of what had followed next, but his heart broke just a little more as his subconscious reminded him that such could never happen again.

_Don't want to close my eyes  
I don't want to fall asleep  
Cause I'd miss you baby  
And I don't want to miss a thing  
Cause even when I dream of you  
The sweetest dream will never do  
I'd still miss you baby  
And I don't want to miss a thing_

His smile faded as the song continued playing through his mind. There was so much he missed in her life. He could watch her, but she would never even know that he was still looking after her. His heart raged at the memory of what had forced their love to be shattered. He had always thought it would be Gambit, but he had never dared think that his own actions might bring about their doom. He had had no choice, he reminded himself for the millionth time that one night. He had had to do what he had done. He had had to do everything within his power to stop Magneto from destorying the world not only for himself or the world but most importantly for his sweet, beloved Rogue. He had had no choice, but he still didn't know if she would ever be able to forgive him . . . or, for that matter, if he would ever be able to forgive himself. The price of victory would have come at too dear a price if not for one thing: His Rogue still lived, and she, like every other living being on the entire planet, would have been killed if he had not stopped Magneto. That and the simple fact that he had no other choice were what allowed him to still be able to "live" with himself after all he had done.

_Lying close to you feeling your heart beating  
And I'm wondering what you're dreaming  
Wondering if it's me you're seeing  
Then I kiss your eyes  
And thank God we're together  
I just want to stay with you in this moment forever  
Forever and ever_

Joseph's thoughts began to turn as Rogue stirred slightly in her sleep. He wondered what she was dreaming of, and although he hoped it was him, he knew that it was most likely LeBeau. Tears began to slip silently down her cheeks then, and his suspicions were confirmed as she continued to cry in her sleep. His blue eyes blazed with unspoken fury, and his hands balled into angry fists. He could not blame Rogue for having fallen back into LeBeau's arms after his death, but he would have gladly beaten the Cajun to a bloody pulp if he had been able to. Instead, all Joseph could do was watch his beloved cry out the pain that swelled in her heart.

"Oh, Rogue," he breathed though no one there could hear him. "What has he done to you this time?" How could one man be so stupid? No, LeBeau wasn't a man but only a male. No true man could harm a woman as wonderful as Rogue as greviously as that horrid Cajun continued to do seemingly every day. As Rogue continued to cry, Joseph's heart continued to shatter. He wanted nothing more than to be able to comfort his one true love, but as he tried to put his arms around her, he merely passed straight through her as if she was not even there.

_Don't want to close my eyes  
I don't want to fall asleep  
Cause I'd miss you baby  
And I don't want to miss a thing  
Cause even when I dream of you  
The sweetest dream will never do  
I'd still miss you baby  
And I don't want to miss a thing_

Just as they always did when he watched Rogue cry, tears began to well in Joseph's own blue eyes and run silently down his cheeks. Tonight, however, he cried for more than her. He also cried for their shattered romance. He would have done anything in his power to have made her happy. He would have given her anything that was within his power to give or get if he did not already have it. Yet while in giving her the one thing that could keep her alive, he had simultaneously destoryed any chance of their ending up happily together and, he knew, of her finally being permanently happy. Gambit would never be able to make her happy; he cared too much for himself and too little for Rogue. What had he done? Had he saved Rogue's life and her world only to condemn her to a life of broken hearts?

_I don't want to miss one smile  
I don't want to miss one kiss  
I just want to be with you  
Right here with you, just like this  
I just want to hold you close  
Feel your heart so close to mine  
And just stay here in this moment  
For all the rest of time_

The words of the song still held as true as they had the first time he had sang them to her. There was nowhere he wanted to be except right by her side for the rest of eternity and even beyond. His every fiber ached for her. His arms cried out to be able to hold her close to him, and his heart was only half a heart without hers beating together in unison with it. He didn't want to miss anything of her -- not one smile, not one kiss, not even one look -- and yet he could never again be with her in her world. He knew that she would be forced to come to his world when her time came, but despite how terribly he longed for her, he would do anything in his power to keep her alive and well. Unfortunately, there was no longer anything within his power to do. All he could do was watch her from afar for the rest of her life.

_Don't want to close my eyes  
I don't want to fall asleep  
Cause I'd miss you baby  
And I don't want to miss a thing  
Cause even when I dream of you  
The sweetest dream will never do  
I'd still miss you baby  
And I don't want to miss a thing_

A stray beam of the rising sun flitted across Rogue's bed as a soft breeze rustled her curtains. Joseph's head picked up to alert, and he forced himself to tear his eyes away from Rogue long enough to glance out her window. As soon as he had confirmed that the night was indeed fading, Joseph's loving but heart-broken gaze returned to his love. "Until tonight, my beloved Rogue. I love you forever," he spoke though he knew she could not hear him. Head down and shoulders slumped in his misery, Joseph turned and walked away, passing straight through her bedroom door.

_Don't want to close my eyes  
I don't want to fall asleep  
I don't want to miss a thing_

Rogue again stirred in her sleep, but this time she called out a name. "Joseph?" she whispered pleadingly, but his ghost was already gone.

**The End**


End file.
